Within Darkness
by artemis-nz
Summary: He carries with him his own light. He just has to find it. Touya/Yuki.


**To clear up any confusion: this fic is based around an actual episode of the series, when Yukito faints in his house. Since its never really looked at in the series or in many fics, I decided to go with Yuki's perspective on what actually goes on _during_ the faint.  
Hope you all enjoy, and I would love some reviews on this, considering this is something new that I've not really written of before.**

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The thing that panicked him the most was that it was so dark.

Not black, even. _Dark_. So dark that no colour could seep in. It wasn't like being blind, or having your eyes shut. It wasn't like a cloudy day, either, and it far surpassed his vague feelings that he remembered (did he?) of the door being closed when he was a child, the night light not switching on no matter how many times he moved the switch up and down.

It was so dark that he couldn't even move. It frightened him, the dark that paralyzed him so that he couldn't open or close his eyes, didn't even know whether they were open or closed because he couldn't feel his body. His mind screamed at him as if from a distance - it was too logical. How can you move your own body when you can't even feel it there. Yet his mind was still here... why couldn't he hear?

Why couldn't he see, feel, sense anything? Just the eternal darkness - it had no beginning and no end, and so he was stuck here, hovering in space, his body gone, his sense of up or down or left or right or inside or out gone where he couldn't follow. Where was Touya?

He wanted Touya - it was the one real memory now, the only thing that could help him find his way back. But he couldn't feel his own throat, let alone find the voice to call out. Where was his voice? Where was he? Where was Touya...

The darkness was closing in, deafening. He could hear nothing, and yet the darkness was within his very mind, inside as well as out. It could drag him away, he would never be able to see or hear or feel anything again, he was trapped, he was helpless, he just wanted Touya.

Without a voice, he could only scream within his own mind: _Touya! Touya, where are you, come find me, I can't hear you Touya, I'm here, don't leave me in this prison, I can't find you, you have to find me, Touya-_

And on and on it went, until perhaps he was deafened by the echo of his own mind, his total being overwhelmed with just that one thought, one thought that had to be enough to break through the intense dark, so dark he was drowning in it, choking, gasping, writhing, struggling, it wanted to keep him here-

_Yuki._

He stopped struggling against invisible bonds. A voice. How could he hear it when he didn't have ears? But there it was again, a lone voice, far away, maybe too far to reach-

_Yuki. I'm here._

Where, _where?_ It was frustrating, it made him want to kick out and yell with a voice that didn't exist.

_Just open your eyes, Yuki. Just open them. _

He couldn't, could he? Where were his eyes? Where was the light, where was the feeling of his own self?

_Just open your eyes, and I'll be here. Concentrate, Yuki._

And it dawned upon him that he had to have eyes to open, because that voice wouldn't couldn't lie to him, ever. His head was tingling... his head. That meant his eyes... somewhere in the dark, there was himself. He just had to find it, before the darkness swallowed him up. If that happened, he could never open his eyes again-

_Don't worry. Just concentrate. Please!_

The voice - he could never deny it anything.

And so he opened his eyes.

It hurt, even as the memories were fading again. The light cut into the blackness and stung him so that his eyes opened only slowly, like they had been shut for so long that any light, no matter how faint, might make them water. Where had he been? A dream, a nightmare... he was a child, calling for someone in a power cut? The night light that wouldn't switch on... was it a dream, the dark?-

"Yuki!"

Two eyes - not his, someone else's. He couldn't recall whose yet, his mind too foggy to process anything. But the feeling was relief, gladness, hope... the eyes made him feel warm. Had he been cold, then? His voice came back to him, though he could scarcely hear or know what he was saying.

"To-ya..."

"What's happened to you?"

A voice to match the eyes, so concerned, so welcoming.

"I suddenly felt sleepy again..." It was hard to think, still foggy, like his mind itself had slept along with his body... what was Touya there for? "I'm okay", he said, not wanting to cause his friend worry. "... What are you doing at my house?"

"Why? You're the one who said we'd go to the festival, right? After waiting for a while..." Touya trailed off. Yuki remembered dimly that he was supposed to have met him... a festival, somewhere, outside...

"I'm sorry." It seemed the only thing to say, although part of him protested that he wasn't just apologizing for making Touya wait. But Touya brushed it off.

"Ah, its okay. If we leave now, we can catch Sakura-"

But then he was suddenly falling, unable to hold his own weight.

_Fainting_, said his mind. _Fainting again. The dark-_

"Yuki!"

Touya's voice kept him there, suspended, and if it was the dark come back so quickly, Touya's voice held it off. For how much longer? Yuki's voice was leaving him again, though, and he could only manage to say, faintly, "I'm sorry... I'm really sleepy..."

And he was, his eyes closing of their own accord, his body sagging, weak. Touya held him up, his hands warm. Yuki could at least feel that. Maybe those hands kept the dark at bay along with his voice. Still safe then, for now... safe enough even to sleep, perhaps?

He felt himself drifting off, the last feeling more warmth as Touya hugged him closer, maybe feeling how cold he was.

And, for a time, he knew no more.


End file.
